Legalizing undocumented immigrants should be our first immigration priority, and Americans support a full pathway to citizenship

 

More than half of all Americans in a CNN/ORC International poll argued that the first priority on immigration should be providing a pathway to legal status for undocumented immigrants living in the country, while only 41 percent believed that stopping unauthorized immigration should be the top priority. These results stand in sharp relief to similar polling done in 2011 and before, when a majority of Americans believed that stopping unauthorized immigration should come before allowing undocumented immigrants access to legal status. As CNN Polling Director Keating Holland argued, “The Republicans’ insistence that border security be the primary focus of U.S. immigration policy may have been a popular stand in 2011, but not necessarily in 2014.”

Overall, 8 out of 10 Americans believed that undocumented immigrants who have been in the country for years and are employed, speak English, and would pay back taxes should be allowed to become citizens, while nearly two-thirds of those polled stated that they would oppose a bill that only granted legal status but no way to achieve citizenship. Both of these results were more or less consistent regardless of whether the respondent was a Democrat, a Republican, or an independent. It is clear from the poll that the American public supports a full pathway to citizenship, not merely the granting of second-class legal status. This poll in no way implies that security at our borders does not also remain a seriousl problem that must be dealt with simultaneously.   

 

Comment:

 

The Boston Irish Group has steadfastly and unwaveringly stood in support of the concept that the very first step toward meaningful and lasting U.S. immigration reform must be a permanent resolution of the plight of undocumented people currently living, working, and raising their families here in the U.S. Many came here fleeing oppression in their native countries. In some cases, the oppression was political, in others it was economic. We are convinced if they thought that the United States of America offered them, through hard work, the opportunity to make a good and decent life for themselves and their families, they should be given the opportunity to prove themselves. On this 238th birthday of the United States of America, let us pledge to continue our proud heritage as a nation who has always granted opportunity to people from other lands and has benefitted greatly from our generosity and our vision for the future. 

Also it should be noted that unlike other immigrant service providers, the Boston Irish Group which is comprised of American citizens, green card holders, and undocumented Irish nationals have never asked for or accepted a single penny for the services that they provide to the undocumented community that they serve. 

 

Jack Meehan, National President Emeritus 

Ancient Order of Hibernians in America

Boston Irish Group

Boston Irish raise $180,000 for Katie O’Halloran's bionic arms

Counihan @irishcentral April 29,2014 04:00 AM

The Boston Irish have done Katie O’Halloran proud and raised over $180,000 towards her campaign to purchase bionic arms.

Backed by Mayor Marty Walsh, the Irish American community in Boston have taken Katie’s 'Born to Run' campaign to their hearts.

The 22-year-old law graduate from Connemara is now almost two thirds of the way towards her target of $400,000 to purchase prosthetic arms.

Katie was born with Femur-Fibula-Ulna Syndrome, leaving her without arms and with a short, deformed right leg.

She has told how she wants to expand her independence with the help of Bebionic prosthetic arms and has been astounded by the public reaction to her campaign’s fund-raising efforts, both at home and in America.

Katie met with Mayor Walsh on the eve of the Boston Marathon when many runners raised sponsorship funds in her honor.

She was also the beneficiary of a major fund-raising night in Dorchester which took the total funds raised over the $180,000 mark.

Her campaign team posted on Facebook: “Thanks to everyone for your generosity and supported with our great fundraiser last night. Katie and her family are overwhelmed by the support they have received since they arrived in Boston.”

With family roots in Connemara, Mayor Walsh was delighted to support the recent benefit night in Freeport Hall, Dorchester, just around the corner from where he grew up.

Mayor Walsh told the Irish Examiner: “The Irish community always supports their own and my uncle, Peter, has been very involved in the community and they asked me to get involved and help out a little bit.

“I’m here to support Katie in all the efforts that are being done. This is very big and this is very big to Boston. It’s very important to the community and I want to be as supportive as I can be.”

Stunned by the reaction, O’Halloran told the Irish Examiner: "It’s surreal, unbelievable. I’m really surprised and glad that the Irish in Boston think my story is something they can get behind."

Runners led by Galway man Michael Cloherty have completed three marathons in three weeks on Katie’s behalf, in Connemara, London and Boston.

Cloherty explained to the paper: “I was doing it for a huge cause. If I was just doing it for myself there would have been days I wouldn’t have bothered. But it was for Katie. We grew up near each other, our families know each other – that took the difficulty out of it.”

The fund-raising embraced by the Irish American community in Boston will change Katie’s life forever.

She added: “It will transform my life really. To be able to do small tasks like shake a person’s hand, carry a handbag, open doors. I’m just really happy so many people have put in so much effort.

“These arms will give me more independence. I’m okay when I’m inside the house, I can do everything for myself, I write and do my make-up with my foot. I can bring myself to the bathroom, but when I’m out I’m stuck. I need someone to open doors for me, bring me to the bathroom, carry bags.

“Right now I can manage most things with my foot but as I get older my leg might not be as flexible.

“I’d like to be a normal 22-year-old. Now my social life is like that of an older person, everything has to be planned out in advance. These limbs would allow me to be spontaneous.”

Read more: http://www.irishcentral.com/news/Boston-Irish-raise-180000-for-Katie-OHallorans-bionic-arms-VIDEO.html#ixzz30I5NFaGP
Follow us: @IrishCentral on Twitter | IrishCentral on Facebook

 

The Faces of True Heroes

With heavy hearts, we join our firefighters in mourning the loss of their brothers, Lt. Eddie Walsh and Firefighter Mike Kennedy. The thoughts and prayers of the entire City of Boston are with the families of Eddie and Mike as well as with all of our firefighters and their families.

Be safe, be strong and know that the people of Boston are there for you, just as you prove day after day that you are there when we need you!

“Greater love hath no man than he who would lay down his life for his friends”

IRA leader is charged in murder case on evidence from Boston College tapes

Patrick Counihan March 23,2014

A former IRA leader has been charged in connection with the murder of mother of 10 Jean McConville based on confessions he made during the Boston College tapes recording sessions.

The Boston College project begun in 2001 and was aimed at securing the recollections of key figures in The Troubles to the events of The Troubles.

Critics claim that witnesses were falsely told their testimonies would only be released after their deaths. Sinn Fein have claimed that the tapes were biased against their members and overseen by key researchers who were out to get Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams.

A Belfast court heard on Saturday that the police case against 77-year-old Ivor Bell is based on an interview he allegedly gave to researchers at the US college.

The prosecution claimed the transcript actually indicated Bell had ‘played a critical role in the aiding, abetting, counsel and procurement of the murder of Jean McConville’.

McConville was abducted and killed in 1972 by the IRA amid allegations she was a police informer a charge her family has always denied.

Bell was refused bail and remanded in custody by a district judge in Belfast accused of aiding and abetting in the murder as well as membership of the IRA.

His lawyer alleged that the prosecution case was that an interviewee on one of the Boston tapes, referred to only as ‘Z ’, was his client.

Boston College interviewed a number of former paramilitaries about the Troubles on the understanding transcripts would not be published until after their deaths.

The project was headed by journalist Ed Moloney a fierce critic of Gerry Adams and researcher Anthony McIntyre who opposed the Sinn Fein peace strategy. Moloney also published a book “Voices from the Grave” which contained allegations by two of those interviewed who had died against living figures in SInn Fein.

The undertaking that no tapes would be released until the participants died was rendered ineffective when a US court last year ordered that the tapes be handed over to PSNI detectives.

Boston College and the two principals, Moloney and McIntyre have been sharply critical of each other since the tapes were seized by British authorities.

The interviews included claims about the 1972 murder of McConville, one of the so called Disappeared whose body was found on a County Louth beach years later.

She was abducted by the IRA at her home at Belfast, shot dead and then secretly buried.

Lawyer Peter Corrigan told district judge Amanda Henderson: “During those interviews Z explicitly states that he was not involved with the murder of Jean McConville.”

The report adds that Corrigan also questioned the evidential value of the interviews, pointing out that they had not been conducted by trained police officers.

He added:“The defence submits that the evidence does not amount to a row of beans in relation to the murder of Jean McConville.”

Bell sat impassively in the dock wearing a grey jumper as his lawyer made the claims.

Some of Mrs McConville’s children watched on from the public gallery.

A PSNI detective inspector told the court that he can connect the accused with the charges but rejected Corrigan’s interpretation of the Boston College interview.Police opposed bail on the grounds that the defendant would likely flee the jurisdiction as he had previously used an alias to travel to Spain and could use contacts within the IRA to travel beyond Northern Ireland.

Corrigan refuted that claim.

He said: “Are the prosecution seriously suggesting that a man in this serious ill health, who can’t walk up steps, is going to abscond for an offense where he has every incentive to attend court?”

Bell was remanded in custody to appear before court again next month.

After the hearing, Mrs McConville’s son Michael said the family’s thoughts were with their mother.

He said: “The pain of losing her has not diminished over the decades since she was taken from us murdered and secretly buried.

“She is in our hearts and our thoughts always. Whatever the future holds nothing will ever change that.”

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/case-against-mcconville-accused-based-on-boston-college-interviews-1.1735104?page=2

Comment:

Even a fish wouldn’t get caught if he kept his mouth shut. Any “self styled hero” who would kidnap, torture, murder, and bury the mother of ten children in a grave known only to the perpetrators, deserves the severest punishment that he can be sentenced to. Assuming that the allegations of collusion against her were true, why wasn’t she given a lighter sentence such as being banished from Belfast. At least then, ten innocent children could have been brought up by their mother instead of in an orphanage. It appears to me that those who suffered the most from this act of sheer barbarism were ten innocent children who saw their mother taken violently from them never to be seen again.

Jack Meehan, National President Emeritus

Ancient Order of Hibernians in America

 

Taoiseach urges action on US immigration reform

Simon Carswell, Arthur Beesley

Last Updated: Saturday, March 15, 2014, 08:03

 

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has issued a direct plea in Capitol Hill to the speaker of the US House of Representatives to quickly forge a deal on immigration reform.

Mr Kenny’s uncompromising remarks to John Boehner came as US President Barack Obama urged political leaders in Northern Ireland to return to talks to break the political deadlock over flags, parades and the past.

 

“I was disappointed, the US government was disappointed that the all-party talks could not arrive at a final conclusion and agreement,” Mr Obama said.

On a busy day of political meetings in Washington to mark St Patrick’s Day, Mr Kenny reiterated the message that undocumented Irish immigrants are treated badly under decades-old legislation and wish only to play their full part in American society.

 

The remarks stand as his strongest intervention on US immigration law, one of the most deeply divisive questions in US domestic politics.

 

At the shamrock ceremony in the East Room of the White House last night, the Taoiseach noted St Patrick himself was an immigrant when he came to Ireland. “We know America will sort this out,” Mr Kenny told the gathering.

 

He had pressed the message earlier in private talks with Mr Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in the White House and used the platform of a Capitol Hill lunch hosted by Mr Boehner to say a renewed effort was urgently required. Mr Boehner, who is a staunch opponent of Mr Obama’s political agenda, is a pivotal figure as his control of Republican votes in Congress can determine the fate of draft laws to overhaul immigration rules which have already passed the Senate.

 

According to Mr Kenny’s official spokesman, the Taoiseach departed from his prepared speech to tell the lunch gathering that it was well past the time for action.

“It is unfair. They want to earn their money. They want to pay their taxes,” the spokesman reported he said.

 

“They want to sing their national anthem and when they sing they want to sing in the land of the home of the free and the brave which they aren’t at the moment.”

The Taoiseach said Mr Obama wants Irish Ambassador to the US Anne Anderson and other Irish representatives to engage with all parties in the debate.

 

“There are a number of propositions before the legislature at the moment,” Mr Kenny told reporters.

“The important thing, however, is that there would be a process of legalisation for people who are here undocumented, that they could pay their taxes, contribute to American society, raise their families, and have the freedom to travel over and back,” said Mr Kenny.

 

Comment:

Please pay particular attention to the last part of the Taoiseach’s statement. He states very emphatically that the plight of our undocumented Irish nationals currently living here in the U.S. should be addressed first. There is no such mention of a so called “Irish E-3 temporary work permit” for  prospective emigrants from Ireland. As we have said from the start, the issue of permanent visas (not temporary work permits) for those wishing to emigrate in future can be addressed after the immediate problem is resolved.    

Jack Meehan, National President Emeritus

Ancient Order of Hibernians in America

Boston Irish Group – Board Member

GOP comfortable ignoring Obama pleas for vote on immigration bill

By Russell Berman - 10/25/13 – The Hill

For President Obama and advocates hoping for a House vote on immigration reform this year, the reality is simple: Fat chance.

Obama repeatedly since the shutdown has sought to turn the nation’s focus to immigration reform and pressure Republicans to take up the Senate’s bill, or something similar.

But there are no signs that Republicans are feeling any pressure.

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has repeatedly ruled out taking up the comprehensive Senate bill, and senior Republicans say it is unlikely that the party, bruised from its internal battle over the government shutdown, will pivot quickly to an issue that has long rankled conservatives.

Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), a leadership ally, told reporters Wednesday there is virtually no chance the party would take up immigration reform before the next round of budget and debt ceiling fights are settled. While that could happen by December if a budget conference committee strikes an agreement, that fight is more likely to drag well in 2014: the next deadline for lifting the debt ceiling, for example, is not until Feb. 7.

“I don’t even think we’ll get to that point until we get these other problems solved,” Cole said.

He said it was unrealistic to expect the House to be able to tackle what he called the “divisive and difficult issue” of immigration when it can barely handle the most basic task of keeping the government’s lights on.

“We’re not sure we can chew gum, let alone walk and chew gum, so let’s just chew gum for a while,” Cole said.

In a colloquy on the House floor, Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) asked Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) to outline the GOP's agenda between now and the end of 2013.

Cantor rattled off a handful of issues – finishing a farm bill, energy legislation, more efforts to go after ObamaCare – but immigration reform was notably absent.

When Hoyer asked Cantor directly on the House floor for an update on immigration efforts, the majority leader was similarly vague.

“There are plenty of bipartisan efforts underway and in discussion between members on both sides of the aisle to try and address what is broken about our immigration system,” Cantor said. “The committees are still working on this issue, and I expect us to move forward this year in trying to address reform and what is broken about our system.”

Immigration reform advocates in both parties have long set the end of the year as a soft deadline for enacting an overhaul because of the assumption that it would be impossible to pass such contentious legislation in an election year.

Aides say party leaders have not ruled out bringing up immigration reform in the next two months, but there is no current plan to do so.

The legislative calendar is also quite limited; because of holidays and recesses, the House is scheduled to be in session for just five weeks the remainder of the year.

In recent weeks, however, some advocates have held out hope that the issue would remain viable for the first few months of 2014, before the midterm congressional campaigns heat up.

Democrats and immigration reform activists have long vowed to punish Republicans in 2014 if they stymie reform efforts, and the issue is expected play prominently in districts with a significant percentage of Hispanic voters next year.

With the shutdown having sent the GOP’s approval rating plummeting, Democrats have appealed to Republicans to use immigration reform as a chance to demonstrate to voters that the two parties can work together and that Congress can do more than simply careen from crisis to crisis.

“Rather than create problems, let’s prove to the American people that Washington can actually solve some problems,” Obama said Thursday in his latest effort to spur the issue on.

But Republicans largely dismiss that line of thinking and say the two-week shutdown damaged what little trust between the GOP and Obama there was at the outset.

“There is a sincere desire to get it done, but there is also very little goodwill after the president spent the last two months refusing to work with us,” a House GOP leadership aide said. “In that way, his approach in the fiscal fights was very short-sighted: it made his achieving his real priorities much more difficult.”

 

Comment:

 

Once again Mr. Obama has left a hot button issue to languish on the shelf until the last minute and then trots it out to be dealt with “immediately, if not sooner”. He has employed this method in the past to divert the public’s attention away from another issue that is not going well. Unfortunately, it is a tired old strategy that doesn’t work too well with those who understand the game of politics. House Republicans are not falling for it this time and the current session of Congress is very quickly coming to a close. Perhaps, the President may have gone to the well once too often on this issue. But then again, he doesn’t have much to lose politically because, as he has reminded us recently, he is not running for re-election.

 

Jack Meehan, National President Emeritus

Ancient Order of Hibernians in America

Irish Immigration Activist

Immigration Reform Groups Resume Fight

Immigration Reform Groups Resume Fight

 October 22, 2013 - Politico -Seung Min Kim

 

 With the brutal fiscal fight now in Capitol Hill’s rearview mirror, immigration reform advocates from across the spectrum are ramping up the pressure on lawmakers to pass a far-reaching overhaul this year.

 

The more aggressive wing of the immigration reform community is launching a “week of escalation” that will target the top three House GOP leaders and roughly two dozen other Republican lawmakers. Their goal is a vote on immigration reform this year. And the Evangelical Immigration Table is releasing a letter Monday signed by top faith leaders — a missive that comes amid a nationwide prayer blitz for reform.

 

There’s a glimmer of hope that the House will pass immigration reform this year, but after the shutdown’s end, it’s faint at best. Although the Senate passed comprehensive reform in June, most House Republicans remain highly skeptical of such sweeping overhauls, and there’s no indication that chamber will move its own package of reform bills anytime soon.

 

Nonetheless, advocates are resuming the fight.

“The dynamics on this are very different than what we saw on the fiscal issue,” said Ali Noorani, who leads the pro-reform National Immigration Forum. “We’re seeing this groundswell of support for reform from the right; … we don’t see that groundswell from both sides of the spectrum on any other issue.”

In a new letter, the Evangelical Immigration Table urges the House to continue working on immigration and take up reform that includes a pathway to legalization or citizenship for the more than 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. The letter, provided to POLITICO, includes signers from the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, as well as Sojourners, and is mostly complimentary of the House, although it criticizes an interior enforcement immigration bill that passed the Judiciary Committee in June.

“The work the House has done on immigration reform thus far is commendable,” reads the letter from the Evangelical Immigration Table, which has convened more than 40 major prayer gatherings and roughly 400 smaller ones scattered throughout 40 states.

 

Meanwhile, the Fair Immigration Reform Movement, an umbrella organization for an array of immigration rights groups nationwide, wants to intensify the pressure on House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) as well as 26 Republicans who represent areas with a significant population of Latino and Asian voters. The so-called escalation events will focus on pushing the lawmakers for a vote on comprehensive immigration reform through visits to their Washington and district offices.

 

“You should expect to see more escalations and more … civil acts of disobedience,” said Kica Matos, a spokeswoman for the coalition, who added that activities will also be planned for November. Groups in the Fair Immigration Reform Movement have held several events at which reform advocates have gotten themselves arrested to call attention to the issue.

 

Meanwhile, Noorani’s Forum is involved in organizing an event Oct. 28-29 during which more than 300 conservative backers of immigration reform will press lawmakers on the need to take up a comprehensive overhaul. They come from more than 50 congressional districts, and among the major GOP-friendly groups involved in the effort are the Partnership for a New American Economy, a pro-reform coalition headed by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg; the U.S. Chamber of Commerce; and FWD.us, the advocacy organization founded by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, according to Alex Katz, a spokesman for Bloomberg’s group.

 

There is still some under-the-radar activity on the issue in the GOP-led House.

A swath of Republicans is still quietly crafting bills that would each overhaul a different section of the immigration system. Five bills have passed key committees, and Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte of Virginia has indicated that his panel is working on four more immigration measures.

 

One would be a legalization measure for young undocumented immigrants being spearheaded by Cantor. Another is a bill providing temporary visas for immigrant workers by Republican Reps. Ted Poe of Texas and Raul Labrador of Idaho. A committee aide said Goodlatte currently has no timetable to bring up the other immigration bills.

 

There is also a bill that would create a biometric exit system sponsored by Rep. Candice Miller (R-Mich.) intended to reduce visa overstays, but that measure would go through the Homeland Security Committee.

The official word from House Republican leadership is that the chamber still has immigration reform on its agenda, with Boehner spokesman Michael Steel saying the speaker “remains committed to a step-by-step process to fix our broken immigration system.”

 

But Republicans privately and publicly say their already testy relations with President Barack Obama have been poisoned by the rancorous fiscal battle, which ended with a major capitulation from congressional Republicans. Rep. Raul Labrador, a conservative backer of immigration reform, encapsulated that thinking at a recent forum when he said it would be “crazy” for House Republicans to negotiate with Obama after the grueling past few weeks.

“The president’s attitude and actions over the past few weeks have certainly made getting anything done on immigration considerably harder,” a senior congressional Republican aide said in an email.

 

Florida Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, one of the House’s biggest GOP proponents of a rewrite of U.S. immigration laws, acknowledged that the shutdown and debt limit battle “clearly … doesn’t make it easier” for reform. Still, he dismissed the influence that Obama may hold in the House on immigration.

“The president has not been a factor, has never been a factor and as far as our efforts in the House, won’t be a factor,” Diaz-Balart said. “I don’t mean to sound disrespectful, but he needs to do what he’s been doing for the last five years, which is just nothing.”

 

Kevin Appleby, director of migration policy for the pro-reform U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, noted that Boehner emerged from the fiscal fight with widespread praise from his conservative flank, which may provide him with some room to maneuver within his Republican Conference.

“It might give him some leverage,” Appleby said, who noted that his group has “only gotten positive messages” from House GOP leaders on immigration. “I think at this point, I think the stakes are higher because the American public is playing closer attention to how Congress conducts its business.”

 

Democrats have made it clear that enacting immigration reform is next on their agenda after the bruising shutdown and debt ceiling battles.

Obama placed it high on his list of priorities in a speech on the day the government reopened. House Democrats have released a comprehensive immigration bill designed to pressure their GOP counterparts, but that has not attracted Republican support and will not go anywhere. And Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said he wants to refocus on the issue.

“I think we need to get this done,” Reid said on Univision’s “Al Punto” on Sunday. “And I will never agree to anything that doesn’t have a pathway to citizenship.”

Aside from embracing a piece-by-piece process advocated by Goodlatte, the House Republican leadership hasn’t committed to a timeline or strategy for bringing immigration bills to the floor. How much Democratic support the bills would need is unclear. A bloc of House conservatives has pledged to vote against any immigration measure, even if they support the policy, to prevent the chamber from entering into a formal conference committee with the Senate and its Gang of Eight bill.

 

Immigration advocates were heartened somewhat by the final agreement that lifted the nation’s debt limit and ended the government shutdown, which did not gain majority support from Republicans and had to be carried by Democratic votes. They believed that it showed a willingness on Boehner’s part to allow critical legislation to pass by breaking the so-called Hastert rule, which requires majority backing from the party in control of the House.

 

But that may be more of an apples-to-oranges comparison, as some note.

“At some point, you have to fund government; at some point, you have to deal with the debt,” said NumbersUSA President Roy Beck, who supports reducing immigration. “There’s absolutely no similarity between those and the immigration bill.”

 

The other complicating factor is time.

Diaz-Balart said that is his chief concern. The debt ceiling and shutdown agreement lays out a series of short-term deadlines, such as a mid-January expiration of government funding and a debt limit that is raised until Feb. 7. The Treasury Department’s extraordinary measures could buy more time on the latter, but it’s unclear how much. But that timeline means this fall is the likeliest window Congress has to work on immigration before lawmakers will again be consumed by fiscal issues.

 

“There’s a very clear window now for the next month or two,” said Jeremy Robbins, director of the Partnership for a New American Economy. “The key is to make the case for the political imperative.”

 

 Comment:

If anybody thinks that this legislation is going to sail right through Congress, they must also believe in the tooth fairy. The Obama administration, specifically Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and the President, steadfastly refused to negotiate with Congress on the debt ceiling and "Obamacare" and now they expect Congress to turn the other cheek and allow immigration reform to be passed without any opposition by the same members of Congress who were told there would be no negotiation the other two issues. As a staunch, long standing proponent of  immigration reform I truly hope that I am wrong but I fear that the Obama administration's intransigent attitude has raised the ire of many in Congress. Unfortunately, the immigration issue could suffer as a result.

 

Jack Meehan, National President Emeritus

Ancient Order of Hibernians in America